The embassy of Japan in Lebanon announced in a statement, that “in response to the massive forest fires that erupted in Northern Lebanon during the months of July and August of this year, Japan has allocated a donation through a project implemented by the International Organization for Migration.”
The embassy stated that this donation is to “enhance the capacity of local authorities to respond to the fires in the region.”
“This initiative, which was successfully concluded by the International Organization for Migration in cooperation with the ‘Akkarna’ association”, included the provision of necessary firefighting equipment and personal protection equipment,” the statement explained.
The Japanese embassy stressed that this is “to support first responders in containing any potential fire in safe and effective ways, and organizing training for municipalities in northern Lebanon to contribute to the management of disaster risk in the region.”
“The project also included “cash-for-work” activities to support the livelihoods of local communities that participated in cleaning forests to prevent fires,” it added.
It regretted that “Lebanon is witnessing once again devastating fires that devoured forests and agricultural areas, especially in the South and Mount Lebanon in the past few days.”
“Japan will remain by Lebanon’s side during these ordeals, and will continue to support the development and environmental projects throughout the country, in the hope of curbing the outbreak of large-scale fires in the future,” the embassy stated.
Lebanon has recently witnessed wildfires in the south and also in Mount Lebanon that lasted nearly three days. Similarly, fires occurred in Northern Lebanon in July and lasted nearly four days.
In recent years, forest fires have erupted consistently in Lebanon. It all began in October 2019, when a series of over 100 forest fires erupted and spread across large areas of Lebanon’s forests.
The Lebanese authorities did not, and still do not, have a fire prevention plan.
The Ministry of Defense sold the Sikorsky firefighting aircraft last July after ordering to be auctioned off, because of their high cost and scarcity of spare parts.
